Atlas Shrugged

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rich by such methods. Such men do not remain rich for long. The money will go into channels which will
carry it, not to the most productive, but to the most corrupt. By the standards of our time, the man who
has the least to offer is the man who wins. That money will vanish in projects such as the San Sebastian
Mines,"
She asked with effort, "Is that what you're after?"
"Yes."
"Is that what you find amusing?"
"Yes."
"I am thinking of your name," she said, while another part of her mind was crying to her that reproaches
were useless. "It was a tradition of your family that a d'Anconia always left a fortune greater than the one
he received."
"Oh yes, my ancestors had a remarkable ability for doing the right thing at the right time—and for making
the right investments. Of course, 'investment' is a relative term. It depends on what you wish to
accomplish. For instance, look at San Sebastian. It cost me fifteen million dollars, but these fifteen million
wiped out forty million belonging to Taggart Transcontinental, thirty-five million belonging to stockholders
such as James Taggart and Orren Boyle, and hundreds of millions which will be lost in secondary
consequences. That's not a bad return on an investment, is it, Dagny?"
She was sitting straight. "Do you realize what you're saying?"
"Oh, fully! Shall I beat you to it and name the consequences you were going to reproach me for? First, I
don't think that Taggart Transcontinental will recover from its loss on that preposterous San Sebastian
Line. You think it will, but it won't. Second, the San Sebastian helped your brother James to destroy the
Phoenix-Durango, which was about the only good railroad left anywhere."
"You realize all that?"
"And a great deal more."
"Do you"—she did not know why she had to say it, except that the memory of the face with the dark,
violent eyes seemed to stare at her—
"do you know Ellis Wyatt?"
"Sure."
"Do you know what this might do to him?"
"Yes. He's the one who's going to be wiped out next."
"Do you . . . find that . . . amusing?"
"Much more amusing than the ruin of the Mexican planners."
She stood up. She had called him corrupt for years; she had feared it, she had thought about it, she had